RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/271228/republican-nevertrump-tic-bruce-thornton

Having suffered from Trump Derangement Syndrome for two years, those disaffected Republican NeverTrumpers have developed a verbal tic. Whatever the topic, they can’t resist taking a few shots at Trump that are usually irrelevant to whatever point they are making. They are seemingly unaware that in doing so they function as Fifth Columnists for the progressives, at the same time they repeatedly demonstrate the entitled arrogance of the entrenched elite that Trump successfully ran against, and that they continue to deny exists.

Here’s an example from NRO’s Jonah Goldberg in a column contrasting John McCain and Donald Trump. And not surprisingly, considering Goldberg’s persistent animus against Trump, the comparison is invidious. You know what’s coming when Goldberg gratuitously contrasts McCain’s captivity in Hanoi with Trump’s five draft deferments. Of course, a splendid service record and medals for bravery are admirable, but not necessarily guarantees of political wisdom. They are achievements deserving of honor, but they don’t exempt a mediocre politician from criticism. Goldberg’s contrast is merely a species of ad hominem attack.

Goldberg uses this fallacy as a lead-in to another simplistic contrast: between “the forces of democracy and the forces of nationalism,” a struggle the nationalists, as he defines them, are winning. Again, this is an either-or fallacy rooted in choosing one dimension of some nationalisms, such as Russia’s, and then proclaiming via another begged question that Donald Trump embodies it. Goldberg finishes with an even more egregious begged question: “Trump defines national interest in almost autocratic terms,” hinting at the preposterous smear that Trump is some sort of inchoate Adolph Hitler.

https://spectator.org/the-senates-unremembered-ex-pow/
Such a contrast to the excess of the last several days.

is path to distinguished service in the United States Senate led through the Naval Academy, aerial combat over hostile territory, and long years of confinement, beatings, and torture in the Hanoi Hilton.

He was a man worth remembering.

No, his name was not John McCain.

Six years before McCain’s election to the Senate, Alabama voters sent retired Rear Admiral Jeremiah Denton to Washington’s upper chamber.

Both the parallels and the divergences in Denton and McCain’s lives tell something about the last few decades of our political history.

Twelve years older than McCain, Denton was born in Mobile in 1924, the same year as George Herbert Walker Bush. After studies at the Jesuits’ Spring Hill College, Denton transferred to Annapolis where in 1946 he graduated in a class that included a young man from Americus, Georgia, named Jimmy Carter. Denton excelled academically, earning a master’s in international relations from George Washington University and winning the Naval War College’s award for best thesis. Diligent in his study of philosophy and history, he was respected as a strategic thinker.

Denton, at 41, was one of the oldest active American pilots in Vietnam when his A6A Intruder, leading a squadron of 27 other aircraft, was shot down over North Vietnam in 1965. (His friend and contemporary, George H.W. Bush, meanwhile was one of the youngest American pilots in the Second World War.)

McCain, the son and grandson of four-star admirals, was erratic as a student at Annapolis. He graduated number 894 out of 899 members of his class. When he was shot down in 1967 he was 31 years old.

Denton suffered imprisonment for nearly eight years, McCain for nearly six. Both men gained national and international attention for defiant courage during their ordeals. As son of the admiral commanding the U.S. Pacific fleet, McCain spurned Communist Vietnamese efforts to manipulate him for propaganda purposes. Denton, as one of the top-ranking officers, outwitted the enemy when they featured him in a televised propaganda news conference. Unbeknownst to his captors, he blinked his eyes with the Morse Code letters T-O-R-T-U-R-E as he answered questions.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/congress-waits-waits-waits-for-sally-yates-documents

Obama appointee Sally Yates was acting attorney general under President Trump for just 10 days — from Jan. 20, 2017 until Jan. 30, 2017 — but by any measure they were consequential days. Even now, two issues from Yates’ brief tenure are still of interest to congressional investigators. One was the series of events that led Yates, in charge of the Justice Department, to reject the president’s executive order temporarily suspending the admittance into the United States of people from some Muslim nations. The second is Yates’ role in the FBI’s questioning, apparently on dubious premises, the president’s national security adviser, Michael Flynn, four days into the new administration — questioning that ultimately led to Flynn’s guilty plea in the Trump-Russia investigation.

Both are matters of great public significance and interest — and on both, the Justice Department is refusing to allow the Senate Judiciary Committee access to documents from Yates’ time in office.

On Feb. 23, 2017, Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Chuck Grassley wrote to Attorney General Jeff Sessions asking for “all emails to, from, copying, or blind-copying Ms. Yates from Jan. 20, 2017, through Jan. 31, 2017.” Grassley also asked for all of Yates’ other correspondence from that period, plus records of her calls and meetings.

The reason Grassley cited — his committee has direct oversight authority over the Justice Department — was that Yates’ order to the Justice Department not to defend the president’s executive order cost the administration precious time as it prepared to fight the inevitable legal challenges. The Department did not have its facts together when a federal judge in Washington state demanded them, setting the stage for the judge to issue a temporary restraining order.

https://amgreatness.com/2018/09/03/burying-the-dead-with-bile

The big news last week revolved around the funerals of a 1960s pop singer and an unreliable Republican senator with a cult following among masochistic conservatives and cynical leftists eager to capitalize on his capacity to spread dissension among his nominal allies.

I suppose the exploitation of funerals for grubby political ends is nothing new. Mark Antony did it with notable success when he eulogized Julius Caesar in 44 B.C. But there was something especially stomach-churning about the injection of partisan animus into the obsequies of Aretha Franklin and John McCain.

Both were reminders—as if we needed any—of how these jangled, hyperpartisan times have the capacity to infect even the most solemn ceremonies of life with bile-filled histrionics, our latter-day version of the theater of the absurd.

The race hustling reverends Al Sharpton and Michael Eric Dyson led the bandwagon at Franklin’s funeral, loading their praise of the soul singer with vicious anti-Trump rhetoric. Dyson described the president of the United States as an “orange apparition,” a “lugubrious leech,” a “dictator” and “fascist.” Nicely done, Reverend!

The tone at John McCain’s spectacle was more restrained but the message of hatred and contempt for the president was just as patent.

The professional NeverTrumper and Twitter activist Bill Kristol sniffed that “I don’t believe the name of the current occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue was mentioned during the service for John McCain, and I’ll continue that practice, in McCain’s honor, for the rest of the day. Today was a moment to celebrate, appreciate and reflect on what is admirable.”

https://amgreatness.com/2018/09/02/trump

For months, I’ve been driving on different routes through the vast San Joaquin Valley back and forth from the California coast—and through the usually economically depressed small towns on and near the Highway 99 corridor through the Central Valley. The poverty rate in many valley counties is higher than in West Virginia. It is a world away from Hollywood, Silicon Valley, the Stanford or Caltech campus, Malibu, and Pacific Heights.

In an overregulated, overtaxed state of open borders and sanctuary cities, with the nation’s near highest electricity and gasoline prices, and facing a looming state and local pension unfunded liability of well over $300 billion, one might not expect much of an uptick from the supposed Trump economic revival. California’s calcified strategy, after all, is that global lucre pouring into coastal high-tech and finance will more than balance out the economic damage wrought by state government. Sacramento is a sort of court jester to Menlo Park.

Throughout California’s coastal and mountain forests there are waves of dead trees unharvested after a devastating drought. There are large fields of recoverable gas and oil in lots of places that are not being drilled, as well as valuable ores and metals not being mined, and unmatched farmland deprived of its long ago contracted water rights. The idea of a renaissance in the vast rich interior of the state seems implausible—especially when state government is more interested in banning plastic straws and mandating gender-neutral restrooms than in building dams or roads.

Signs of Hope in Central California
Yet signs for help wanted along highways are now ubiquitous—truckers, welders, fabricators, assemblers. Agriculture worries not just in perennial fashion about the lack of farm harvesters, even at wages of $10.50 to $14 dollars an hour. Now they’re short of forklift drivers, packing house workers, and mechanics.

New housing construction is growing after roughly a decade’s hiatus, at least to the degree carpenters, electricians, and plumbers can be found. Upward mobility is evident. At the local Walmart, the checkers often tell me they’re leaving despite raises—for better paying jobs. I drive home to my farm by a new warehouse that seems under endless construction. I finally ask the neighboring business, why? Answer: they cannot find or keep workers. The same reply comes from a friend redoing his house. Painters and floor workers no sooner start to paint and tile than they are hired away. Many now working have never held a fulltime job.

http://www.tmz.com/2018/08/30/john-mccain-casket-air-force-2-trump-approved/

John McCain is finally getting his due respect from President Trump — his body is being flown to Washington D.C. on an aircraft that had to be approved by POTUS.

The late Arizona senator’s casket was loaded onto one of the jets known as Air Force 2 — which is often designated for the VP or First Lady’s travel. As you know, 45 will not be attending McCain’s service in D.C. … reportedly because McCain wanted it that way.

Still, Trump announced earlier this week he had greenlit military transport for McCain, saying, “At the request of the McCain family, I have also authorized military transportation of Senator McCain’s remains from Arizona to Washington, D.C., military pallbearers and band support, and a horse and caisson transport during the service at the United States Naval Academy.”

Prior to the statement, Trump was being incredibly stubborn on publicly speaking about McCain’s passing … refusing to answer questions about the Senator, and even briefly returning the White House flag to full-staff. It was eventually lowered back to half-staff.

There was no love lost between Trump and McCain. Then-candidate Trump mocked McCain’s military service, saying he was not a war hero because he’d been captured in Vietnam.

A memorial service was held for McCain Thursday in Arizona, where a lot of people spoke in remembrance of the political maverick … including a teary-eyed Joe Biden. McCain will lie in state at the Capitol Rotunda Friday before another memorial service Saturday.

http://www.stolinsky.com/

Thomas Sowell describes what he calls Stage One thinking. This type of thinking is common in small children and so-called progressives. When these people want something, they throw a tantrum and make a huge mess until they get it. But they give no thought to what damage will result from their tantrum. And they give no thought to what will follow if they get what they want. That is, they seem totally unaware that there will be a Stage Two.

This type of behavior is annoying but tolerable in small children, whose minds have not yet matured to the point that they can foresee the results of their actions. But this behavior is even more annoying, and even less acceptable, in supposed adults. More to the point, this behavior can be dangerous, not only for the childish adults, but also for all the rest of us.

Destroy statues.

First it was statues of Confederate generals like Robert E. Lee. The stated motive was to remove objects of veneration that represented supporters of slavery. What the real motive was I leave for you to discern. Now monuments to Columbus are being trashed, busts of Lincoln are being defaced, and the Lincoln Memorial is being spray-painted with obscenities. What does this tell us?

But if removing statues of Confederate generals is so important, why is it not equally important to erect statues of Union generals? If statues of Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson are so offensive that they have to be removed, why are not statues of Ulysses S. Grant, William Tecumseh Sherman, Phil Sheridan, Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, and Robert Gould Shaw so praiseworthy that they have to be erected?

At the memorial for John McCain, Barack Obama said:

“After all, what better way to get a last laugh to make George and I say nice things about him to a national audience.”

Well that’s a grammatical error. It should have been “After all, what better way to make George and me say nice things about him to a national audience.”

Obama never released his academic records from Occidental (1979-1981), Columbia (1981-1983), or Harvard Law School (1988-1991), but to be fair, I have heard terrible grammar from Summa Cum Laude graduates of the most prestigious schools.

And at least Obama pronounces the word “nuclear” correctly while others, including some intellectuals say “nucular.”

In Woody Allen’s 1989 film “Crimes and Misdemeanors” Mia Farrow’s character says she could never fall for any man who says “nucular”.

https://www.nationalreview.com/magazine/2018/09/10/southern-poverty-law-center-essentially-a-fraud/
The Southern Poverty Law Center has less to do with justice than with fundraising

It had to happen sometime. The Southern Poverty Law Center has made so many vile, unjustified, hysterical, and hateful accusations over the years, it was bound to pay a price. When it did, the bill due was $3.375 million. Such was the amount the SPLC agreed to pay the British Muslim Maajid Nawaz and his think tank, the Quilliam Foundation, after smearing them in a “Field Guide to Anti-Muslim Extremists.” Nawaz, a former Islamist radical turned whistleblower who calls for the modernization of Islam in columns for the Daily Beast and on London talk radio, had threatened to sue the SPLC for defamation — traditionally and properly a difficult case to make in U.S. courts. Yet the SPLC caved spectacularly.

The amusing but uncharacteristically groveling tone of the SPLC’s apology suggests fear of Nawaz’s lawyers: “We have taken the time to do more research,” stated the SPLC (doing research — what a novel idea!), noting that Nawaz has made “valuable and important contributions to public discourse,” adding that he is “most certainly not” an anti-Muslim extremist, and concluding, “We would like to extend our sincerest apologies to Mr. Nawaz, Quilliam, and our readers for the error.” The settlement further stipulated that the SPLC’s president, Richard Cohen, would film a video apology, prominently display it on the outfit’s website, and distribute the apology to every email address and mailing address on the SPLC mailing list. Whether Cohen was further required to come over to Nawaz’s house every week and iron his laundry could not be learned.

The Nawaz settlement was the most damaging episode yet in what has become an increasingly dire situation for the SPLC’s floundering image. Image, painstakingly built since its founding in 1971, is its chief asset. Image is what keeps the dollars flowing in. The Right has long been calling attention to the SPLC’s questionable tactics, but these days even Politico, The Atlantic, and PBS are running skeptical pieces about the saints of the South. Politico wondered whether the SPLC was “overstepping its bounds” and quoted an anti-terrorism expert, J. M. Berger, who pointed out that “the problem partly stems from the fact that the [SPLC] wears two hats, as both an activist group and a source of information.” David A. Graham of The Atlantic wrote that the “Field Guide” was “more like an attempt to police the discourse on Islam than a true inventory of anti-Muslim extremists, of whom there is no shortage, and opened SPLC up to charges that it had strayed from its civil-rights mission.” PBS interviewer Bob Garfield suggested to its president that the SPLC is increasingly seen “not as fighting the good fight but as being opportunists exploiting our political miseries” and that this was tantamount to killing “the goose that lays the golden egg.” In 2015 the FBI dropped the SPLC from its list of resources about hate groups.

https://pjmedia.com/trending/judicial-watch-doj-says-no-fisa-court-hearings-held-to-get-warrants-against-carter-page/

Judicial Watch announced that documents obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request shows that the Obama Department of Justice did not request a formal FISA court hearing to obtain warrants against former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page.

While a court hearing is not necessary to obtain a FISA warrant, it’s shocking that a request to spy on the campaign of the opposition party did not trigger extra caution that a court hearing would have demonstrated.

In the filing the Justice Department finally revealed that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court held no hearings on the Page FISA spy warrants, first issued in 2016 and subsequently renewed three times:

[National Security Division] FOIA consulted [Office of Intelligence] … to identify and locate records responsive to [Judicial Watch’s] FOIA request…. [Office of Intelligence] determined … that there were no records, electronic or paper, responsive to [Judicial Watch’s] FOIA request with regard to Carter Page. [Office of Intelligence] further confirmed that the [Foreign Surveillance Court] considered the Page warrant applications based upon written submissions and did not hold any hearings.

The Department of Justice previously released to Judicial Watch the heavily redacted Page warrant applications. The initial Page FISA warrant was granted just weeks before the 2016 election.

The arrogance of these people is astounding, as JW President Thomas Fitton points out:

“It is disturbing that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance courts rubber-stamped the Carter Page spy warrants and held not one hearing on these extraordinary requests to spy on the Trump team,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “Perhaps the court can now hold hearings on how justice was corrupted by material omissions that Hillary Clinton’s campaign, the DNC, a conflicted Bruce Ohr, a compromised Christopher Steele, and anti-Trumper Peter Strzok were all behind the ‘intelligence’ used to persuade the courts to approve the FISA warrants that targeted the Trump team.” CONTINUE AT SITE